Home » Learn How to Test and Manage Millions Upon Millions of Ads Easily

Learn How to Test and Manage Millions Upon Millions of Ads Easily

Testing ads is going to be a critical step in ensuring that your paid search campaigns both grow and thrive. It is an accepted best practice in the marketing industry. It is also a well known fact that the testing of ads in small accounts is relatively easy. However, with larger accounts, ad testing is often not performed as well as it should be. That’s why, today, we want to take a look at some of the most popular testing techniques, the issues that prevent them from being successfully used, and how you should test ads in large accounts.

Popular Testing Techniques For Large Accounts

One of the most common testing techniques for testing large accounts is also the simplest. All you have to do is turn on the “optimize for CTR” function and enable Google to pick your list of winners. The primary issue with this technique is that the losing ads will not be removed from your list. Even Google is bound to show some losers occasionally.

The second most frequently used method is to test only the head terms or most expensive terms. Ideally, this sounds great. You are investing your time into testing only where you are spending money. However, the reality is that most of your ad groups in large accounts are never going to be tested, so the majority of your keywords are never improved or optimized. Most large accounts do not have a simple, reliable method for testing each one of their ads, and another problem arises in identifying exactly what needs to be tested.

How to Identify Your Test Parameters

Most new accounts are going to focus on a single conversion aspect, like sales or lead generation. However, once these accounts start growing, they will be filled with multiple conversion types. The purpose of having singular ad groups is to drive visitors towards a single aspect of conversion. Be aware that the actual conversion type is going to differ between different ad groups. In most cases, you are not going to be able to test the ads that are built around a particular ad group’s end goal.

Another point that you should take into consideration is that not all keywords are created on equal footing. For example, a select few KWs might seek to push engagement at the top of a buying funnel. In contrast, other KWs are going to have their efficiency determined by the number of direct conversions that they produce. Yet still, other keywords will be brand focused, product names, or simply be generic.

What is needed to address this problem is a system that can easily and quickly label ads according to what their end goal is.

Employing the Assistance of AdWord Labels

This is where AdWord Labels can step in to assist in addressing this problem. This program makes it quite simple to identify the purpose of your ads and various ad groups once you have determined what their overall purpose is. For the first step, you are going to need to create a list of each aspect you know about your ads. Then, you will need to test and determine your winners. The winners are then going to become your end testing segment.

Keep in mind that a single ad may have more than one label attached to it. For example, you might have one ad with the labels of brand and high funnel. On the other hand, a similar keyword might be labeled as product and e-commerce. The labels are going to provide a smooth process for segmenting your ads, so that you can equally analyze all of your brand ads, or only those that have the specific goal of generating ecommerce checkout.

Once you have taken into account the results and the types of ads you have been comparing against one another, labels are going to become much simpler to create, manage, and think about.

Testing Ads On a Large Scale

Once your labels have been devised, the next step is going to be to use simple pivot tables to analyze the ads. Pivot tables are a valuable tool for analyzing ads, but you are going to need to ensure that you use consistent lines, so that they can be simply analyzed on scale. When using a pivot table for analysis, closely examine the ads that are performing the best, but make sure that you also delete the losers, so that your pivot tables will be less cluttered. Do not forget to examine data at the ad group level.

Since you most likely have millions of ads that need to be tested, you are going to need to create a schedule that you can adhere to for testing. The testing schedule that you devise can be based upon the labels. A project management system is the perfect tool for creating an accurate and reliable calendar. As a note of caution, you must ensure that you are testing all of the various types of goals and keywords throughout your entire account.

In Conclusion…

We know ad testing is simple when it comes to small accounts. Mid size accounts are where it begins to become complex. Large accounts are virtually impossible to accurately test if you don’t have a refined process in place for measuring, analyzing, and refining your ads. However, testing for even the largest accounts, can be made simple and manageable through the use of AdWord labels, pivot tables, and a great testing schedule.